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What is Baptism and Does it Save?

For Christ also died for sins once for all, the just
for the unjust, in order that He might bring us to God, having been
put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit; 19 in
which also He went and made proclamation to the spirits now in
prison, 20 who once were disobedient, when the patience of God kept
waiting in the days of Noah, during the construction of the ark, in
which a few, that is, eight persons, were brought safely through
the water. 21 And corresponding to that, baptism now saves you -
not the removal of dirt from the flesh, but an appeal to God for a
good conscience - through the resurrection of Jesus Christ, 22 who
is at the right hand of God, having gone into heaven, after angels
and authorities and powers had been subjected to Him.

Controversy is Essential and Deadly

Let me begin today with a brief introductory word about
controversy. The main thing I want to say is that doctrinal
controversy is essential and deadly. And the attitude toward
controversy in various groups of Christians depends largely on
which of these two they feel most strongly. Is it essential or is
it deadly? My plea is that at Bethlehem we believe and feel both of
these. Controversy is essential where precious truth is rejected or
distorted. And controversy is deadly where disputation about truth
dominates exultation in truth.

The reason controversy is essential in the face of rejection and
distortion is that God has ordained that the truth be maintained in
the world partly by human defense. For example, Paul says in
Philippians 1:7 that he is in prison for the "defense and
confirmation of the gospel." And Jude 3 says that we should
"contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all delivered
to the saints." And Acts 17:2-3 says that Paul's custom in the
synagogue was to "reason" from the Scriptures and "explain and give
evidence" that Jesus was the Christ. So the preservation and
transmission of precious truth from person to person and generation
and generation may require controversy where truth is rejected or
distorted.

But controversy is also deadly because it feels threatening and
so it tends to stir up defensiveness and anger. It's deadly also
because it focuses on the reasons for truth rather than the reality
behind truth, and so tends to replace exultation in the truth with
disputation about the truth. This is deadly because thinking
rightly about truth is not an end in itself; it's a means toward
the goal of love and worship. Paul said in 1 Timothy 1:5 that "the
goal of our instruction is love." And he prayed in Philippians
1:9-11 that our "love . . . abound in knowledge . . . unto the
glory and praise of God." Controversy tends to threaten both love
and praise. It's hard to revel in a love poem while arguing with
someone about whether or not your sweetheart wrote it.

John Owen on Controversy

So controversy is essential in this fallen world, and
controversy is deadly in a fallen world. We must do it and we must
tremble to do it. A wise counselor for us in this is John Owen, the
Puritan pastor from 340 years ago. He was involved in many
controversies in his day - theological and denominational and
political. But he never ceased to be a deep lover of God and a
faithful pastor of a flock. He counsels us like this concerning
doctrinal controversy:

When the heart is cast indeed into the mould of the doctrine
that the mind embraceth - when the evidence and necessity of the
truth abides in us - when not the sense of the words only is in our
heads, but the sense of the thing abides in our hearts - when we
have communion with God in the doctrine we contend for - then shall
we be garrisoned by the grace of God against all the assaults of
men.*

I think that was the key to Owen's life and ministry: he didn't
just contend for doctrine; he loved and fellowshipped with the God
behind the doctrine. The key phrase is this one: "When we have
communion with God in the doctrine we contend for - then shall we
be garrisoned by the grace of God against all the assaults of men."
In other words, we must not let disputation replace contemplation
and exultation.

I am keenly aware that this series of messages on baptism is
more controversial than usual. I am also eager that this pulpit
avoid two great errors: losing truth in the quest for exultation;
and losing worship in the noise of disputation. So let us all pray
that in our lives and in our church we walk the tightrope balanced
by the necessity of controversy on the one side and the dangers of
it on the other.

The Bible itself is a great help in this because it teaches
about baptism, for example, in contexts that are so rich with good
news that it makes it relatively easy to exult as we deal with this
practice of baptism. In fact, baptism itself is meant, like the
Lord's Supper, to point to realities that are so great and so
wonderful that. over all the controversy, we must hear the music of
God's glorious goodness and grace.

Exulting in Christ's Substitution for us

So it is here in 1 Peter 3:18-22. Sandwiching the teaching on
baptism in verses 19-21 there are the same great truths about
Christ and his death and resurrection that we saw last week in
Colossians 2. Let's get these before us for the sake of exultation
before we look between for the necessary disputation.

Verse 18: "Christ also died [literally: suffered] for sins once
for all, the just for the unjust, in order that He might bring us
to God, having been put to death in the flesh, but made alive in
the spirit." Now here is something worth exulting over. Put it in
five parts.

1. We are cut off from God.

First, the greatest problem in the world, the greatest problem
in your life and mine, is that we are cut off from God. We have no
right to approach him. We are alienated from him. You see this
behind the words of Peter when he says that the aim of Christ's
suffering was "that he might bring us to God." Now if Christ had to
die that we might be brought to God, it is clear that we are
alienated from God without Christ. This is the big issue. Not
floods, and not cancer, and not crime, and not war, and not our job
or marriage or kids. The big issue is that we are cut off from God,
our Maker. And if that problem does not get solved, then the anger
of God will rest on us and our eternity will be miserable.

2. It is sin that alienates us from God.

Second, we see what the problem is that alienates us from God,
namely, sin. Peter says, "Christ suffered for our sins . . . that
he might bring us to God." It's our sins that cut us off from God.
This is true legally and it's true emotionally - as we all know.
Legally, God is a just judge and does not simply pronounce the
innocent guilty and the guilty innocent. He is holy and does not
relax in the living room with rebels. Every sin is serious and
pushes him farther away. And emotionally, we know that as our
consciences are defiled by sins we feel so dirty in the presence of
God that we can't lift our faces.

3. God substituted his Son for us.

Third, God has taken the initiative to overcome this alienation
from him by offering Christ to suffer in our place. You see this
great reality of substitution in the words, "Christ also suffered
for sins once for all, the just for the unjust." Here is the great
ground of our hope, that we really can and will come home to God. O
let us exult in this above all the works of God - that he has
substituted his just Son in our place. This is the great gospel.
This is what holds us late at night and early in the morning when
sin and Satan assail us with their accusations and say, you can't
pray to God, much less go to heaven. Look at you! You're a sinner!
To this we say, "Yes, but my hope does not lie in not being a
sinner. It lies in a substitution of the Just for the unjust."

4. The substitution was once for all.

And to add to the glory of it, in the fourth place, Peter, just
like the book of Hebrews (7:27; 9:12; 10:10), says that this
substitution of the Just for the unjust was "once for all" - once
for all time. It need not be and cannot be repeated, because it was
perfect and complete the first and only time it was done. The debt
for all my sins - past, present and future - was paid in a single
sacrifice for all time. O the glory of an objective, finished,
once-for-all gospel performed by God in his Son outside of me apart
from my psychological fickleness.

5. God was satisfied with Christ's substitution.

And fifth, after he had offered himself once for all the Just
for the unjust, God gave him life. "Having been put to death in the
flesh, but made alive in the spirit." This means, at least, that
God was satisfied with Christ's substitution. Which means that if
you will cherish it as the foundation of your life, God will be
satisfied with you, in Christ. God gave Christ life in at least two
senses: one is that God gave him life in the spirit during the
three days while his body was in the grave. We know this because
Jesus said to the repentant thief on the cross, "Today you will be
with me in paradise" (Luke 23:43). Today, not in three days, but
today. The other way that God gave Christ life is that he raised
his body from the dead, and transformed it into a "spiritual body"
- a new kind of body without the limitation of the old "flesh" - a
body suited for the spiritual realm that "flesh and blood" cannot
inherit (1 Corinthians 15:50). So God gave a mighty YES to
Christ's
substitution by raising him from the dead.

That's the top of the sandwich around the teaching of baptism:
"Christ has suffered for sins once for all the Just for the unjust
that he might bring us to God." Welcome home, are the sweetest
words in the world, when God speaks them to our soul.

Exulting in the Subjection of Christ's (and our) Enemies

The bottom part of the sandwich is verse 22: "Christ is at the
right hand of God, having gone into heaven, after angels and
authorities and powers had been subjected to Him." Here we see the
other effect of the death and resurrection of Christ. First was a
substitution for our sins, now we see a subjection of his enemies.
First substitution, then subjection. (Kids, ask mom and dad at
lunch today, "What were the two words that started with "s" to
describe the work of Christ?)

Now don't miss this: we saw the very same thing last week in
Colossians 2:15. When Christ died and rose again, all the evil
angels, and authorities and powers were subjected to him in a new
way. From the beginning of creation he was sovereign over them.
That's not new. But now he has nullified the one thing that they
could use to destroy us, our sin. It's as if the demonic world had
many weapons to harm us, but only one great tank of poison that
could destroy the children of God. And when Christ went to the
cross, he drank the entire tank.

O there is much to contend for here, but for now, this morning,
let us simply exult in this. Let us commune with our God in this.
Let us revel in this reality. That the substitutionary death and
bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ subjected angels and
authorities and powers to him, meaning that in him the elect of God
cannot be destroyed by these enemies. Our great enemies are
subjected to the will of the one who died to save us, and he will
save us. He will not let his work of substitution or subjection be
done in vain.

Does Baptism Save?

Now sandwiched between these two great truths about Christ
(substitution for sinners and subjection of enemies) are the words
about baptism. I preached on this text September 25, 1994. So I
send you to the file cabinet if you want more, but I only have time
here to go straight to the point at issue, namely, the meaning of
baptism. In verse 19, Peter reminds the readers that, in the
spirit, Jesus had gone to preach to the people in Noah's day, whose
spirits are now in prison awaiting judgment. (I don't take the
position that verse 19 refers to Jesus' preaching in hell between
Good Friday and Easter.) But there was tremendous evil and hardness
in Noah's day and only eight people enter the ark for salvation
from the judgment through water.

Now Peter sees a comparison between the waters of the flood and
the waters of baptism. Verse 21 is the key verse: "And
corresponding to that [the water of the flood], baptism now saves
you - not the removal of dirt from the flesh, but an appeal to God
for a good conscience - through the resurrection of Jesus Christ."
Now there are some denominations that love this verse because it
seems at first to support the view called "baptismal regeneration."
That is, baptism does something to the candidate: it saves by
bringing about new birth. So, for example, one of the baptismal
liturgies for infants says, "Seeing now, dearly beloved brethren,
that this child is regenerate, and grafted into the body of
Christ's Church, let us give thanks."

Now the problem with this is that Peter seems very aware that
his words are open to dangerous misuse. This is why, as soon as
they are out of his mouth, as it were, he qualifies them lest we
take them the wrong way. In verse 21 he does say, "Baptism now
saves you" - that sounds like the water has a saving effect in and
of itself apart from faith. He knows that is what it sounds like
and so he adds immediately, "Not the removal of dirt from the
flesh, but an appeal to God for a good conscience - through the
resurrection of Jesus Christ." (Or your version might have: "the
pledge of a good conscience toward God").

But the point seems to be this: When I speak of baptism saving,
Peter says, I don't mean that the water, immersing the body and
cleansing the flesh, is of any saving effect; what I mean is that,
insofar as baptism is "an appeal to God for a good conscience," (or
is "a pledge of a good conscience toward God"), it saves. Paul said
in Romans 10:13, "Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord -
everyone who appeals to the Lord - will be saved." Paul does not
mean that faith alone fails to save. He means that faith calls on
God. That's what faith does. Now Peter is saying, "Baptism is the
God-ordained, symbolic expression of that call to God. It is an
appeal to God - either in the form of repentance or in the form of
commitment.

What is Baptism?

Now this is fundamentally important in our understanding of what
baptism is in the New Testament. James Dunn is right I think when
he says that "1 Peter 3:21 is the nearest approach to a definition
of baptism that the New Testament affords" (Baptism in the Holy
Spirit, p. 219). What is baptism? Baptism is a symbolic expression
of the heart's "appeal to God." Baptism is a calling on God. It is
a way of saying to God with our whole body, "I trust you to take me
into Christ like Noah was taken into the ark, and to make Jesus the
substitute for my sins and to bring me through these waters of
death and judgment into new and everlasting life through the
resurrection of Jesus my Lord."

This is what God is calling you to do. You do not save yourself.
God saves you through the work of Christ. But you receive that
salvation through calling on the name of the Lord, by trusting him.
And it is God's will all over the world and in every culture - no
matter how simple or how sophisticated - that this appeal to God be
expressed in baptism. "Lord, I am entering the ark of Christ! Save
me as I pass through the waters of death!" Amen.

John Piper (@JohnPiper) is founder and teacher of desiringGod.org and chancellor of Bethlehem College & Seminary. For 33 years, he served as pastor of Bethlehem Baptist Church, Minneapolis, Minnesota. He is author of more than 50 books.

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